Archives: Authors

Niyatee Sharma graduated from the Center for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT) as an interior designer and has found her love in writing for children. Her books include The Runaway Peacock, What Can I Be? and Harvest Day and The Tomato Flood. She is usually found tending to her vegetable garden, gobbling chocolate or curled up with a book and her two adorable cats.

Dhananjay Rai teaches at the Department of Gandhian Thought and Peace Studies, Central University of Gujarat. Poorna Swaraj, Constructive Programme: Its Meaning and Place (2023) is his most recent work.

Krishnamurti is regarded globally as one of the greatest thinkers and religious teachers of all time. He did not expound any philosophy or religion, but rather talked of the things that concern all of us in our everyday lives, of the problems of living in modern society with its violence and corruption, of the individual’s search for security and happiness, and the need for mankind to free itself from inner burdens of fear, anger, hurt, and sorrow. He explained with great precision the subtle workings of the human mind, and pointed to the need for bringing to our daily life a deeply meditative and spiritual quality.

Krishnamurti belonged to no religious organization, sect or country, nor did he subscribe to any school of political or ideological thought. On the contrary, he maintained that these are the very factors that divide human beings and bring about conflict and war. He reminded his listeners again and again that we are all human beings first and not Hindus, Muslims or Christians, that we are like the rest of humanity and are not different from one another. He asked that we tread lightly on this earth without destroying ourselves or the environment. He communicated to his listeners a deep sense of respect for nature. His teachings transcend man-made belief systems, nationalistic sentiment and sectarianism. At the same time, they give new meaning and direction to mankind’s search for truth. His teaching, besides being relevant to the modern age, is timeless and universal.

Krishnamurti spoke not as a guru but as a friend, and his talks and discussions are based not on tradition-based knowledge but on his own insights into the human mind and his vision of the sacred, so he always communicates a sense of freshness and directness although the essence of his message remained unchanged over the years. When he addressed large audiences, people felt that Krishnamurti was talking to each of them personally, addressing his or her particular problem. In his private interviews, he was a compassionate teacher, listening attentively to the man or woman who came to him in sorrow, and encouraging them to heal themselves through their own understanding. Religious scholars found that his words threw new light on traditional concepts. Krishnamurti took on the challenge of modern scientists and psychologists and went with them step by step, discussed their theories and sometimes enabled them to discern the limitations of those theories. Krishnamurti left a large body of literature in the form of public talks, writings, discussions with teachers and students, with scientists and religious figures, conversations with individuals, television and radio interviews, and letters. Many of these have been published as books, and audio and video recordings.

Patrick King is an internationally bestselling author and social skills coach. His writing draws a variety of sources, from scientific research, academic experience, coaching, and real-life experience.
He has sold over 1 million books, and he is one of the world’s foremost authorities when it comes to social skills, social psychology, and human behavior. He’s been featured in: GQ Magazine, TedX, Forbes, NBC News, Huffington Post, Business Insider, Men’s Fitness, Inc., ATTN, Real Simple Magazine, and Creative Live.

Bhagwan Chowdhry is a professor of Finance and Executive Director, Digital Identity Research Initiative at the Indian School of Business and a Research Professor at the Anderson School at University of California, Los Angeles.
He received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur.
His research interests, on which he has published several papers in finance and economics journals, are in International Finance, Corporate Finance, Impact Investing, and FinTech. He is an Advisor to several FinTech start-ups.

Anas Ahmed is the Lead Research Officer for the Digital Identity Research Initiative at the Indian School of Business, who has traversed classrooms, boardrooms, and rural communities across India working closely with CEOs and entrepreneurs of the leading financial institutions and start-ups, regulators, bureaucrats and politicians to advise them on accelerating financial inclusion in India.
He pursed economics from Cardiff University, UK and has a profound interest in leveraging technology for economic development. He co-authored a chapter in The Palgrave Handbook of Technological Finance and has contributed numerous articles for newspapers like The Economic Times and The Times of India.

Shashank Mani is the founder of the Jagriti Yatra and the Jagriti Enterprise Centre – Purvanchal (JECP). The Jagriti Yatra is an annual fifteen-day train journey, the world’s largest entrepreneurial one, to the four corners of India in the company of 500 young leaders. The JECP focuses on enterprise led development in Eastern UP.

With a B. Tech from IIT Delhi, and an MBA from IMD Lausanne Shashank has worked in both corporate and government sectors as a strategist and visionary, serving on the $5 Trillion committee of the commerce ministry. A ghumakkad at heart and a public man of action by temperament, he has circled India fifteen times on the Jagriti Yatra, energizing 7,500 leaders in the process.

A doting father, a proud husband, a friend and guide to the people of Deoria, Shashank lives and works in his ancestral village Barpar in Eastern Uttar Pradesh. He is developing his region through Udyamita, a definition of enterprise aimed at invigorating local economy and society.

1893 – 1952 Hailed as the “father of Yoga in the West,” Paramahansa Yogananda is regarded as one of the great spiritual figures of our time. Born in northern India, he came to the United States in 1920, where he founded Self-Realization Fellowship, to disseminate his writings and teachings worldwide. Through his best-selling classic, Autobiography of a Yogi, and his numerous other books, he has introduced millions throughout the world to the spiritual principles of yoga meditation and the universal truths underlying all world religions.

Gargi Rawat is a senior news anchor and environment reporter who has worked with NDTV 24×7 for the last two decades. She was educated at the Welham Girls’ School, Dehradun, and St. Stephen’s College of Delhi University. For many years she has been a regular face on the channel and has filmed several documentaries and environment-related programmes. She worked on the first-ever news show on wildlife in India, Born Wild, and anchored its Hindi version, Safari India, for the Hindi channel NDTV India. Gargi has also been editorial head for some of the best-known environmental campaigns carried out by
NDTV, including ‘The Greenathon’, ‘Save Our Tigers’, ‘Protecting India’s Coastline’ and the ‘Banega Swachh India’ campaign. She received widespread acclaim for her award-winning documentary series on the state of the river Ganga. This is her first book.

Ravi Kant has nearly fifty years of corporate experience across industries. He spent fifteen years at Tata Motors, where he was the CEO and managing director and later vice chairman of the board.

Prior to Tata Motors, he was a director, consumer electronics and on the board of Philips India. He has also worked in senior positions at LML Ltd, Titan Watches, Kinetic Engineering, Hawkins and Hindustan Aluminium.

He is currently on the board of Kone Ltd, Helsinki, one of the top elevator companies in the world, and Hawkins Cookers Ltd, a well-known consumer durable company. He is also the chairman, advisory board of Akhand Jyoti and is associated with two start-ups in the cancer field (Karkinos, India and MedTherapy, USA).

Ravi studied at Mayo College Ajmer, did BTech Hons at IIT, Kharagpur, and M.Sc. in management techniques in industry from Aston University, Birmingham, UK. He was an industrial professor at the University of Warwick, UK, and a distinguished professor at IIT Kharagpur. He was the chairman of IIM Rohtak, IIIT Allahabad and has been associated with NID Ahmedabad and business schools at IIT Bombay, IIT Kharagpur, NUS Singapore and CEIBS, Shanghai.